My name is Jacqueline - I'm a socially moderate, religiously conservative, and politically liberal girl just loving life right now! I'm a 24 year old Master's of Media Studies student at the University of Texas, but an Oklahoma alumni and die-hard Sooner fan! I'm currently writing my thesis - in a nutshell my research is about girls' online lives, particularly informal learning environments. I'm also an English & Language Arts teacher for a local Home School Co-op. When I'm not researching for my thesis or writing lesson plans - I'm usually watching college football! Oh yea, and I'm training to run a half marathon with Teams in Training this winter, I'm pumped!
"The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it." George Bernard Shaw
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Tuesday, April 19, 2005
Some people in Chicago believe an image of the Virgin Mary has appeared on the side of an underpass. Their belief is so strong that they are actually stopping to pray here. Read the story here.
Here's what I don't understand. Nowhere in the Bible does Jesus even hint that we should pray to Mary or that Mary would intercede on our behalf. Christ gave the believers his Holy Spirit when he departed, the Holy Spirit intercedes on our behalf, that is who we pray through, not Mary.
Mary is of course to be loved and honored as the mother of Christ, but she was a mere person.
This so called image on the side of the underpass, first of all doesn't really look like the Virgin Mary to me. And besides, how do we know what the Virgin Mary looked like? Our ideas are based on images that man created. There is nothing wrong with these images or the representation of Mary, but they are mere images created in the minds of man.
Here is a copy of the image: 
Here is what Brandon had to say about it:
strangeguy808: looks like a vagina to me
strangeguy808: or a dementor
weirdcrazyworld: haha yes a dementor
I don't mean to be disrespectful, but it's a stretch to say that looks like the Virgin Mary. It does indeed look like a vagina in the middle, or a demontor (for you HP fans) or maybe a woman dressed in cloth and praying.
Nothing about this image seems unnatural or should elicit prayers to it. Other people are saying it's caused by salt runoff. Why do people look for images of Mary? Shouldn't you be looking for signs of your Creator and Savior. And believe me, those signs are not going to come in the form of salt runoff.
And the scariest thing about this is what some people are saying:
"Everybody's amazed. It's hard to begin to believe, but when you see it, it changed something in you. You believe in the faith," Snezna DiLorenz said.
Faith means NOT SEEING! If you see something then it ceases to be faith.
"I'm praying for everyone I know," said Monica Hammerschmidt, of Cicero. "And I feel like she's here."
It's good that you are praying for people, the Bible commands us to do that anyway. But why in the world would the mother of Jesus leave heaven to come reside under a bridge, seriously?
Oh ye of little faith, if this is what it takes for you to drop to your knees and pray.
*as a disclaimer, I would just like to say that I know not all Catholics pray to Mary, so please don't start leaving me comments telling me you are Catholic and you don't pray to Mary. If you are Catholic and do pray to Mary - I would respectfully like to see some evidence as to why, cuz scripturally I can't find validation for it.
Posted at 3:38 pm by Jac
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Monday, April 18, 2005
From days of old and long ago
Friendships are weird, the life cycle of a friendship is so unpredictable. It seems lately all these people from my past are coming back. Not necessarily back into my life, but contact is being made.
When my mom was up last weekend she was asking me whatever happened to my best friend from the second grade, Kasey Key? Kasey and I were pretty much attached at the hip, she was my first "get into trouble" sorta friend and we did everything together. After the 4th grade she moved to a different school and we pretty much lost touch. I heard through the grapevine that she graduated from The Colony, but that was all I knew.
Well - I found her on facebook the other day and we emailed each other a few times, and it was so great to hear from her. Gah, I loved that girl so much!
Then, last night I checked my email and I had an email from a wonderful long time friend Laura Burmeister. She and I were very good friends in jr. high and then she left our school. She and I stayed in touch on and off through most of high school, but really haven't talked at all in college. It was so nice to hear from her.
You know those friends from preschool that you have vague memories of and you think, "Gee would they even remember me.?" Yes, they probably do. At a new year's eve party in Dallas of freshmen year (college) I ran into a girl I went to preschool with. She and I hadn't so much as thought of each other in 15 years, but we remembered one another and our mutual friends.
Life is crazy and so unpredictable. I think back to high school graduation and all the wonderful friends I had, and it's so weird the ones I've stayed in touch with. I've sadly lost contact with some of my then good friends. But some of the people who weren't that great of a friend are now some of my greatest friends, who I never thought I would stay in touch with (the PHBC group!)
Seriously, no matter how much work goes or doesn't go into a frienship, it almost seems as though there is some external force deciding who will stay in your life and who won't. And it makes life so much more interesting.
I grieve for the friends I have lost sometimes, but ya know, I don't think you ever really lose a friend. Even if time goes by, those memories remain and I will always love my childhood friends, even if I never see them again.
Posted at 10:59 pm by Jac
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You know it's a slow news day at OU when the front page story has a headline that says, "A bill requiring the use of masking tape on campaign fliers failed." Who the heck cares, seriously?!!?
In other news, my boyfriend's little sister's picture is in the paper on page 3 - yay, go Rachel!
Posted at 2:38 pm by Jac
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Thursday, April 14, 2005
Nothing ever just falls into my lap!
Monday night I emailed my professor (History of Media and Social Change) some ideas and struggles I was having with the paper that is due Friday. He emailed me back with some helpful advice so Tuesday afternoon I stopped by his office just to say thanks and let him know I got the email. Well, we started talking and he started telling me how much he likes my ideas and he wants me to have the opportunity to expand upon them, just not for this assignment.
He was hesitant to tell me something, he said he was going to wait til after he read my paper, but after talking to me for a few minutes he asked me if I wanted to do an independent study with him and write a paper to submit to the Honors Undergraduate Research Journal in the spring. I told him I'm graduating in the fall and wouldn't be here in the spring but that I would sitll very much like the opportunity to do research with him. Then we talked about grad schools and basically he is going to guide me in writing a research paper that I can completely cater to submit to graduate school.
I'm suppose to narrow down my grad school selection this summer and look at specific requirements and then pick about five topics I'm interested in and then he'll help me choose one and I'll get to write a research paper with him. This excites me SO much! And seriously, stuff like this never happens to me, I always have to seek out opportunities, which I admit I don't always make the effort I should.
So I left his office very excited and not too disappointed about not being able to do THURJ. However, I checked my email that night and Dr. Keppel had called the honors college on my behalf and found out that even though I'm graduating I'll still be eligible to submit my work to the journal! Double goodness!
Ironically I'm procrastinating on the paper I should be writing for his class right now to blog about an opportunity that doesn't even go into effect until Aug. but I'm just so excited to get the chance to do research in something that interests me and that can help me get into grad school and maybe even get published - and my professor picked me! He liked my ideas, woohoo!
So back to my current paper: Cultural Assumptions, Hegemonic Control, and the Media as a Facilitator...suddenly this doesn't seem as exciting anymore.
Posted at 12:03 am by Jac
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Tuesday, April 12, 2005
Roller coaster favorite ride
I had an absolutely perfect weekend, however the rest of the week is gonna kick my butt.
First the weekend - my mom came up on Friday and she took Brandon and me and my sister and her boyfriend all out to Ted's, yum! We had a really long wait but it was for sure worth it. My mom goes to bed early and she stayed with my sister so I went to The Library with a few friends for a drink.
Saturday we (my mom, my sis and I) went to the Union for the luncheon and stuff, it was ok. Afterwards we went shopping at Harold's outlet, love that store! I got a really cute skirt and shirt and two really cute pairs of shoes. Afterwards we went to the Natural History museum and they had a cool bird exhibit. Then we introduced my mom to the goodness that is Pita Pit. At this point my sister had to leave so it was just my mom and me.
We went to the Art museum which was wonderful, I hadn't been to the new building yet...very cool indeed. It was a beautiful day outside so we decided to go to the duckpond and read...good idea in theory anyway. Turned out to be way too windy to read so we just talked and ended up at Gourmet Vue for reading. Afterwards we went to Victoria's for dinner. Everyone needs to go there and order the Black Pepper Linguine with spinach and crab in a lemon-garlic sauce. SO GOOD!
Came home and my mom was going to bed but we ended up staying up til bout 1 a.m. just talking, so nice. I love my mom! I got to take her to church with me on Sunday and she really liked it. Afterwards we went out with some friends for lunch and that was that.
A truly wonderful weekend!
This week however is probably going to kill me! Why did I decide to start my new job when I have so much school stuff to do this week, I'm not even going to have time to breathe. And get this...the lovely training manager thought it would be a good idea to schedule me, a night-owl college student for not one, but TWO 5 a.m. shifts this week...how the heck I'm going to pull that off I have no idea! I usually go to bed around 3 and now I'm suppose to be waking up at 4. And I have so much homework this week I couldn't go to bed early if I tried.
Oh Lord give me strength for this one, amen!
Posted at 12:25 am by Jac
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